<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Knock at the Guarded Gate by silveryink</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25406857">Knock at the Guarded Gate</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/silveryink/pseuds/silveryink'>silveryink</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Episode: s03e11 The Day of Black Sun Part 2: The Eclipse, Episode: s03e18-21 Sozin's Comet, Gen, Light Angst, Takes place during season 3, Uncle-Nephew Relationship, because i can't write anything without the smallest bit of angst, it started out as an exploration of the white lotus, takes place between this and, then became iroh and zuko feels</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 03:26:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,456</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25406857</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/silveryink/pseuds/silveryink</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Iroh's journey from the Day of the Black Sun to the dawn of Sozin's Comet.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Iroh &amp; Piandao (Avatar), Iroh &amp; Zuko (Avatar)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>250</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>I think of you as my own</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Knock at the Guarded Gate</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>So, uh, this was completely unexpected. When I started to write a ficlet about the White Lotus and what Iroh had been up to after escaping prison, I genuinely didn't expect the word count to get this high.</p>
<p>Writing Iroh's perspective was fun in this one, because without Zuko he would have had to focus on the White Lotus almost completely, and leaned into his instincts as a retired General. Jeong-Jeong is referred to as an ex-Admiral because of his desertion, though I'm not entirely sure if that's the correct military term to use.</p>
<p>Hope you all enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>On the Day of the Black Sun, Iroh breaks out of prison.</p>
<p>He doesn’t even need firebending to do it, which says a lot more about Ozai’s planning than Iroh’s own prowess (though he will admit that not many people would have been able to bend the bars of their cells wide enough to slip through with sheer strength alone). There’s a flicker of guilt in his chest at leaving his nephew to fend for himself in the toxic cesspool that is Ozai’s court, but he’s done the best he can to steer Zuko’s thoughts in the right direction.</p>
<p>The rest is his own choice. Iroh will not, under any circumstances, force his path on him.</p>
<p>Even if the outcome breaks his heart.</p>
<p>He nabs a cloak and a quick change of clothes before slipping out of the palace into the paths leading away from Caldera City, doing his best to imitate Zuko’s featherlight footfall. An errant thought slips through his iron focus that Zuko would probably be a good airbender with how soundlessly and fluidly he moves sometimes, something that the ship’s crewmates used to <em>loathe</em>. Zuko had, after that, made sure to stomp around and overall make a menace of the ample echoing the metal walls created to possibly spite them.</p>
<p>He wonders, just for a moment, if that had been exaggeration to disguise his true intention – to warn the others of his arrival before they could actually see him. He wouldn’t put it past the boy.</p>
<p>The stables are woefully empty, but somehow, an ostrich-horse is tethered to a pole, looking quite comfortable and well-rested. Iroh has an inkling as to whose doing that is. No doubt Zuko had waved off suspicion by calling the handsome creature a war prize, or something of the sort. Not that it matters <em>how</em> the ostrich-horse arrived at the palace, when it’s <em>right there</em> for him to take and escape on.</p>
<p>He doesn’t even need a saddle, simply grabs the reins and swings himself onto its back before urging it away, away from this place that was slowly swallowing his good memories with worse ones he couldn’t possibly hope to replace, away from the heart of what poisoned the Fire Nation, away from his nephew.</p>
<p>The last one almost makes him stop and reconsider.</p>
<p><em>Almost</em>.</p>
<p>As much as he loves Zuko, the world needs some help right now, in the form of the White Lotus. No doubt some plan was set in place to be enacted on the day of Sozin’s Comet – if Iroh knows his brother, he can be certain that the success of that plan would mean nothing less than the worst fate for the rest of them.</p>
<p>So he leaves.</p>
<p>Piandao’s estate is the closest safe place, even if it is an entire day’s journey away. From there, they can map out the rest. No one mentions the ostrich-horse even if they do spot it in the streets, but Iroh ducks out of the common paths into marshy woodland and forest cover as soon as he can. He doesn’t have supplies, but he’s scavenged before. Besides, it’s just about the perfect time for fruit to be ripening in the orchards and groves, so it’s not like food will be in short supply.</p>
<p>As long as he picks the right plants, that is. Fortunately, Zuko had taken care of that by pointedly buying a tattered copy of a list of medicinal and edible plants that he’d made sure they both knew back to front for any sort of emergency.</p>
<p>
  <em>“I’d rather not risk blowing our cover like we did with Song and her family,” Zuko said. “You should be able to recognise these plants on sight if we’re ever on the run again.”</em>
</p>
<p><em>“Zuko, the Fire Nation haven’t managed to get past Ba Sing Se’s wall yet, and it’s highly unlikely that they ever will. We’re </em>safe<em> here.” He read the book anyway, if only to placate his nephew. A lot of the listed herbs could be made into teas if Iroh was a bit creative, which he didn’t mention to Zuko.</em></p>
<p>And yet, his nephew had been correct.</p>
<p>He silently vows to never doubt Zuko’s instincts again, and sincerely apologise for brushing his paranoia aside if he ever sees him again.</p>
<p>That is, if Zuko wants anything to do with him after the war.</p>
<p>He doesn’t doubt his nephew’s love, of course – it’s only that Ozai and Azula would use this escape as a twisted lesson to prove that Iroh never really cared for him, that feelings were weak, and so on. Iroh hopes his nephew hasn’t unlearned everything he’d been slowly nudged towards in the three years he was banished.</p>
<p>It’s all he can do now, at least until he’s out of the Fire Nation.</p>
<p>It’s late at night when he reaches Piandao’s lavish estate. It seems remarkably empty, like he’s been preparing to leave, and Iroh hopes he’s not too late in his arrival.</p>
<p>He knocks.</p>
<p>There’s a minute of waiting that he spends admiring the insignia on the door. It’s a bit too ornate to be noticed by anyone who doesn’t already know, but the pattern is very clearly the same Lotus tile that their order adopted as its logo.</p>
<p>The door opens.</p>
<p>It’s not the butler who opens it.</p>
<p>“Iroh?”</p>
<p>“Good evening, old friend,” he greets wearily. “Would you mind if I stayed here for a while before I leave?”</p>
<p>“It’s time, isn’t it.”</p>
<p>Iroh doesn’t reply – it’s not a question, and they both know it. Piandao ushers him in and carefully seals up the exit.</p>
<p>“I’ve been preparing since the eclipse,” the swordsman says. “I thought Sokka and the others would have managed to end it by now. The Avatar and his friends,” Piandao elaborates, off Iroh’s confused look. “But I can delay it a few days. Prison can’t have been good for you.”</p>
<p>Iroh almost protests, but the truth is that despite the adrenaline that had kept him going for the better part of the day, the eclipse <em>had</em> cut off his inner fire enough to affect him a little bit; just enough that the exhaustion hits harder now than even the days he and Zuko had been on the run with nearly nothing to their name, not even a few scraps of food to get by (until his nephew had started to make a habit of burglary, at least).</p>
<p>He thanks the other man, who shows him to the guest chambers he can stay in until they leave, and Iroh thinks that the bed is almost <em>too</em> comfortable to sleep in after months of the lank bedroll and hard, uneven stone of his cell.</p>
<p><em>Almost</em>, but not quite.</p>
<p>He’s out like a rock.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Something happened.</p>
<p>Piandao knows this well from what he’s observed so far in both Iroh and Zuko, but he’s not sure exactly what. If he knows them both by now, he’d say that they had a falling out, or something along those lines. Neither of them would have had that opportunity considering the absolutely nonsensical chain of events that led to the once revered General Iroh knocking at his doorstep, all but a fugitive.</p>
<p>It’s not even the first time, not even this year.</p>
<p>Piandao’s half tempted to bring out his bottle of sake. The royal family is a mess.</p>
<p>When Zuko had shown up a while ago, asking him if he could forge a new pair of swords for himself, he hadn’t known what to think. Zuko was <em>beyond</em> careful with his weapons, cleaning them and generally taking care of them to the point where they might as well have been ornamental weapons or priceless heirlooms. Upon being asked what had happened to his old pair, Zuko had launched into a long and very odd tale of losing them in an assassination attempt when his ship had exploded, travelling to the Earth Kingdom and lifting a decent pair from some jerk who harassed them (Iroh) on the streets, to lifting a pair from some soldier in Ba Sing Se in order to fight some other kid spontaneously.</p>
<p>He’d wished he hadn’t even asked.</p>
<p>By the time he’d put together the rest of the tale along with reports from the White Lotus, Zuko had already forged new, stunning swords for himself with minimal supervision.</p>
<p><em>“Your skill has grown, my prince,”</em> was all he’d said, and he’d been somewhat amused (and slightly saddened) to find that Zuko was still as bad at accepting compliments, if worse, than he’d been as a child.</p>
<p>And now Iroh’s eyes turn sadder at every mention of the prince, the same way Zuko’s had when Piandao had mentioned his uncle. There was a bigger story to the subjugation of Ba Sing Se, then.</p>
<p>“I suppose you have many questions,” Iroh observes over lunch. The man had slept nearly to midday, and Piandao hadn’t had the heart to rouse him when he so clearly needed the rest. As it is, it’s evident that he’s doing much better now than last night.</p>
<p>“Obviously.”</p>
<p>“I can only do my best to answer,” the Dragon of the West says. “I’m afraid my information isn’t exactly up to date.”</p>
<p>“I think you can answer this one just fine,” Piandao says, leaning across the table. “What happened at Ba Sing Se, that day?”</p>
<p>He almost regrets asking when Iroh’s face falls and twists with something like grief. “Would you like the short version, or the long one?”</p>
<p>Piandao glances out at the large sundial and supposes there’s enough time to talk. “The long one.”</p>
<p>A nod, and a sharp inhale. Then Iroh slowly, gravely unfolds the story of how Azula and her friends infiltrated Ba Sing Se and took it down from within, the whole showdown culminating in Zuko choosing to fight alongside the princess instead of the Avatar following the offer that had been presented to him – his father’s love and pride, and his reinstation as a respected prince instead of a disgraced one.</p>
<p>Piandao wishes he could run all the way to the palace and run his jian through Ozai’s heart right now – <em>none</em> of those things should have been the ultimate desires of a sixteen-year-old. Not when they should have been given freely (save the ‘respected prince’ bit, which should simply reflect on one’s character). He <em>does</em>, however, swear for a good minute with his head in his hands. No wonder Zuko had looked so lost when he’d stayed at the estate for a few days – he’d been trying to force himself into the image of the son his father wanted, not who he really was.</p>
<p>“I know how you feel,” Iroh says quietly. “Unfortunately, I cannot try to return to the palace and convince my nephew to choose the path that is best for him; one that he makes for himself. The fate of the world lies in the Avatar’s hands. If he cannot find a firebending teacher soon, we shall have to unveil ourselves to him.”</p>
<p>Piandao hums. “We should meet up with Jeong-Jeong before alerting the others. Bumi should have managed an escape by now, considering the soldiers patrolling Omashu would have been powerless on the day of the eclipse.”</p>
<p>“And what of Pakku?”</p>
<p>“I’ve sent him a missive,” the swordsmaster says. “He should be able to meet us in the Earth Kingdom.”</p>
<p>Iroh blinks. “So we’re going <em>there</em>?”</p>
<p>Piandao smiles grimly. “Oh, yes. After all, you <em>are</em> supposed to take Ba Sing Se while the Avatar faces off the Fire Lord.”</p>
<p>A grimace. “Hmm. Then I suppose we should get moving.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>The first bit of news hits them when they’re leaving the Fire Nation with Jeong-Jeong. Piandao, the only man in their group who currently isn’t wanted by the authorities, comes back from a supply run with more than what they need.</p>
<p>“There are several rumours in the village,” he comments, as Iroh helps him sort out the supplies into packs and mentally divides them into rations till they move past the next (and final) outpost. “The most prominent one being that the prince turned traitor.”</p>
<p>Iroh frowns. Zuko is one of the most loyal people he knows, even to people who don’t necessarily deserve it. <em>Betrayal</em> is a fault that only exists in his nephew’s mind. The closest he came to it was in the catacombs under Ba Sing Se – and even that could be easily written down as a terrible choice with terrible consequences.</p>
<p>“I know, I thought the same thing. No one knows the full story, but apparently they’ve got out a warrant for him, <em>again</em>. They think he joined the Avatar.”</p>
<p>His heart almost stops at the words, and his hands still on the straps of the pack. “How many variations of this rumour did you hear?”</p>
<p>Consistency usually means truth, and the more garbled a story becomes with each telling, the more likely it is to be a massive exaggeration, if not outright falsehood.</p>
<p>“Few. It’s highly likely this is the truth.” Piandao levels him with a <em>look</em>. “If you can find him…”</p>
<p>“The Avatar needs a firebending teacher,” he grits out slowly. “Besides, he’ll be safer if we don’t call attention to him, even by accident.”</p>
<p>Piandao snorts. “How long do you think <em>that</em>’s going to last? Zuko’s instincts are excellent, but you know that <em>subtlety</em> might as well not be in his vocabulary.”</p>
<p>Iroh closes his eyes and exhales slowly, smoke trailing with his breath. Spirits, he needs some time alone to meditate.</p>
<p>“He’ll be safe with the Avatar,” he decides at last. It’s sorely tempting to go seek out his nephew, but if Zuko <em>has</em> joined their little team, his presence would only pull unwanted notice towards them. Zuko’s conspicuous enough, even without the very identifying burn on his face for all to see.</p>
<p>Piandao’s frown deepens, but he doesn’t say anything else. Iroh knows that the man is fond of his nephew – as one of the few more earnest students who never complained about the work or abused his power and status, as well as through being personally acquainted with both Zuko and Iroh outside of his lessons. Still, their mission is the highest focus at the moment, and he knows it. As much as Iroh hates not being able to be there for his nephew, he knows that time for reconciliation will only be available after the war – that is, again, only if Zuko still wants anything to do with him and <em>didn’t</em> take his silence for indifference.</p>
<p>He hopes the Avatar and his friends will be able to help Zuko see exactly what his childhood was missing and <em>accept it</em> without hesitation. The earthbender he chatted with while hunting down Zuko in the Earth Kingdom would definitely help…</p>
<p>“We should go,” he tells Piandao. “If the schedules haven’t changed, there should be a ship ready to depart in three hours. Just in time for us to reach the port.”</p>
<p>“I’ll get the Admiral,” Piandao mutters sullenly. Iroh chuckles. Jeong-Jeong’s strange outlook on firebending, while not completely unrelated to his own philosophy, is starting to grate on him too. He seemed to look at it as a curse instead of a fact of life, like blood running through one’s veins. Which is… wrong. There’s more risk to firebending simply because fire can be summoned from nothing so long as they had a reasonable supply of air, and that it can go uncontrolled rather quickly, but the man seems to hate his ability with a vengeance that reminds Iroh more of the visceral fear Zuko had of fire in the first couple of months following his banishment.</p>
<p>Then again, it’s not the <em>bending</em> and how Jeong-Jeong hates it that irritates the swordsman. It’s the hermit lifestyle he adopted after deserting the Fire Nation that he seems to be intent on sticking to, even now. There’s faint yelling from behind the bushes, and Iroh snickers as he shoulders his pack and ties together the others’. As long as he isn’t a part of their fighting, it’s actually rather amusing to watch the normally level-headed swordsmaster argue with the hot-tempered ex-Admiral.</p>
<p>Bumi would probably love the spectacle, he thinks, when he finally goes to break up the quarrel, much like his days on his nephew’s ship.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The second rumour reaches him through Bumi, of all people. The Earth King shares anecdotes about the Avatar’s childhood antics with him over some tea as they set up camp outside Ba Sing Se. The rest of the White Lotus is answering the call, slowly filtering into the enclosed, secluded area that has remained a closely-guarded secret as a safehouse, and now the largest base for their order.</p>
<p>Anyhow. It’s over tea that Bumi brings it up.</p>
<p>“I heard that some war prisoners managed to escape from the Boiling Rock,” he says calmly.</p>
<p>Iroh chokes on his ginseng. “From <em>where</em>?”</p>
<p>“The Boiling Rock,” Bumi repeats. “The Water Tribe chief,” he lists off, “a Kyoshi Warrior – their leader, I think; and the prince of the Fire Nation. Oh, and some other criminal.”</p>
<p>
  <em>What does Zuko have to do with this?</em>
</p>
<p>“Apparently your nephew and one of his friends tried to infiltrate and extract Chief Hakoda, and the Kyoshi Warrior – I say <em>tried</em>, but I mean <em>succeeded</em>. The princess was upset, obviously.”</p>
<p>Zuko… infiltrated the most secure prison in the Fire Nation… as a <em>prisoner?</em></p>
<p>“<em>What</em>.”</p>
<p>Bumi shrugs. “I think it was the non-bender that Piandao trained a while ago. He’s the Chief’s son, you know,” he adds.</p>
<p>Yes, Iroh knows. He’s met the boy before, in the North. “I see,” he settles with for his answer. He doesn’t see, not really – he’ll have to send out scouts for more details later, perhaps write to someone in the Fire Nation. The latter strikes him belatedly as not the most ideal of plans, but the former is… not that bad. Scouts would be incredibly useful so long as they converge a fortnight before the day of the Comet.</p>
<p>“Hmm,” Bumi says, and returns to his tea. Iroh spends the rest of the afternoon wondering when his nephew will grow out of his impulsiveness, or if he ever really will.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The final bit of news comes in form of his nephew himself.</p>
<p>He catches Zuko’s form out of the corner of his eye when he wakes up on the morning of the comet and stiffens.</p>
<p>What’s to happen now?</p>
<p>“Uncle, I know you must have mixed feelings about seeing me,” he starts hesitantly, and it takes all Iroh has in him to not react to the words. He’ll hear his nephew out first, now.</p>
<p>“But I want you to know,” Zuko continues, voice cracking with emotion, “that I’m so, <em>so sorry</em>, Uncle.” There’s a pause, and the tension building in his heart slowly fades to relief, that Zuko still wants to see him, not just for the sake of the world, but for himself, as uncle and nephew. It’s an incredibly personal choice, and Iroh is <em>so proud</em> that he made it, and so very grateful too.</p>
<p>“I’m so sorry and ashamed of what I did,” Zuko adds. “I don’t know how I can make it up to you, but–”</p>
<p>In a flurry of movement, Iroh spins around and yanks his nephew into his arms by the collar of his tunic. Zuko’s form is stiff under the trembling and silent tears – because of <em>course</em> there are, and just as Iroh had been worried about his nephew’s reception of him, Zuko had probably been terrified of rejection and thought it would be well-deserved.</p>
<p>“How can you forgive me so easily?” his nephew asks, his voice a little high from desperation. “I thought you’d be <em>furious</em> with me!”</p>
<p>Iroh holds him tighter, as though he can transmit his thoughts and emotions through touch alone. “I was never angry with you,” he murmurs, cradling the back of Zuko’s head gently with his arm – a permission to seek comfort, because that’s one thing Zuko wouldn’t do unless explicitly being told that it was <em>okay</em>.</p>
<p>“I was sad because I was afraid you had lost your way.”</p>
<p>Zuko stills, and Iroh pulls away. He doesn’t meet his eyes when he says, quietly, “I <em>did</em> lose my way.”</p>
<p>“But you found it again.”</p>
<p>He looks up now, and Iroh smiles at his nephew. “And you did it by yourself. <em>And</em>, I’m so happy you found your way here.”</p>
<p>Zuko’s smiling now, the small, soft one Iroh so rarely sees anymore, and he can’t help but pull him back into another hug. “It wasn’t that hard Uncle,” he mumbles into his shoulder. And, because he’s still a sixteen – no, <em>seventeen</em>-year-old, with all the sass that comes with: “You have a pretty strong scent.”</p>
<p>Iroh laughs.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>